Transcript

Taylor: Happy New Year listeners, and welcome back to Sisters Assemble. This is our first episode of 2024 and our fourth calendar year. This marks our fourth calendar year as a podcast bringing you all new episodes. If you listened to our last episode of 2023, you know it is a jam-packed year and we are getting started hitting the ground running with our reactions to What If? Season Two, our full reactions to What If? Season Two because as you know, we were doing quick recaps for every episode. If you haven’t checked those out, definitely highly recommend you do. We have ratings for every single episode, whereas this content will be mainly looking at the season as a whole. So if you’re looking for episode-by-episode ratings or breakdowns, definitely check out our Instagram and all of our socials where we have those videos up for you. Without further ado, I’m going to kick it over to Kate. She’s going to get us started on this What If? review.

Katie: Yeah, I mean, it’s kind of crazy to say that one, we’re already in 2024 and two, we’ve now had our second show conclude with their second season and possibly a third on the way as a lot of news has been coming out with that already. I think it’s easiest to start with What If Season Two, honestly, I actually think it’s easier to compare it first to Season One because again, this is the only second show that has had a previous season that has now come out with its second full season, and I think it’s good to kind of see what we liked and didn’t like between both of them. And so if we kind of start there, I think I liked more specific episodes from Season Two more, but I think I liked Season One as a whole better.

Taylor: I’m trying to decide if I am 100% in agreement. I do think that a lot more of the episodes in Season Two got me super hyped, but I’m not sure if that’s because I understand the premise of the show better in Season Two than I did in Season One. I think in Season One we kind of went into it going, well, what is this and what does it mean? And I think in Season Two, we had a better understanding, we understood how elements of it could play out in live action. Obviously, seeing Captain Carter in Multiverse of Madness was huge. So, I think coming in with that context automatically is going to make Season Two seem better because it’s less questioning. So I’m not sure if that’s why I think I liked Season Two better because I never got the chance to go back and rewatch Season One and if going back with the hindsight that we have now on Season One would make me like it better. I will agree that there were elements of Season Two that I think Season One did better. Namely, and I know you’re going to agree on this because we were texting about it earlier, namely the finale. I think Season One, other than the Gamora episode, which got moved to this season, did a really good job of giving us each Guardian of the Multiverse their backstory. And you could see in Eight how we were building into that larger storyline with the Watcher stepping in and building the team and all of that. And it felt really again, other than Gamora, it felt really seamless and you saw a logical progression as the season moved on. Now, with this season, I was struggling when we got to Nine with Doctor Strange being the bad guy because he’d only spent what, a total of 30 seconds on screen through a couple of episodes? It just felt like it was so rushed and they maybe missed an episode. I don’t know if we’re going to see an episode in Season Three that felt like it should have been the setup for the finale in two, because I just was like, how did we get here? I don’t get it. This was like a real 0 to 60 in like 3.5.

Katie: I will say there’s a strange irony to it because while we literally did miss an episode in Season One leading to the finale, you didn’t feel it. I mean, you kind of were like, oh, Gamora is here, wearing pretty much Thanos’s armor and we don’t really know how she got here. We don’t know her story, but we know everyone else’s so we kind of just were like, okay, it’s fine. Everybody kind of wasn’t worried about it in the long run because they also did the finale so well. Versus to your point, I really hate to say that I really dislike the finale, but the longer I sit on it, the more I don’t like it. And I mean, I watched it first thing in the morning so that we could get our reactions up or our little baby reactions to the episode up and I honestly was like, oh, I really hope this isn’t it. Then it was and I was like, oh, okay, that happened and then I calmly went and watched Percy Jackson because I was like, I need something else. That was not what I wanted that to be. Honestly, the thing is, I didn’t have an expectation so it wasn’t like I didn’t meet it. It just like wasn’t anything and that’s just the best way for me to put it was it didn’t feel like it was a culminating point to a season. And I think it bothers me because it’s like, okay, maybe they wanted to stray away from what they tried in Season One, I totally get that. But then it’s like, why’d we watch episodes pretty much One through Eight, then? That’s my question is I’m like, that’s cool, we saw Nebula in the first episode and, you know, Happy saved Christmas and we got to see some of that and we did get some callback, if you looked closely. In some of the universe destroyers, you see a Happy Hogan as a weird version of a Hulk and everything, so you do get a reference. But beyond that, I was like, what was the point of me watching these episodes then, if it didn’t really feel like it had anything to do with the ending?

Taylor: Yeah, it actually felt like the ending was the ending to a different season. It felt like an ending, but not to the eight previous episodes that we’d watched, other than smashing him in those last couple of minutes, but only in a couple of episodes. Like maybe if he had been in all of them and we’d seen him in the background of the Peter Quill 80s Avengers episode.

Katie: And like, stealing young Peter.

Taylor: Yeah, or the background of the Happy Hogan saves Christmas episode, to your point, because you did see a young Peter in one of those crystals as well.

Katie: Exactly, right.

Taylor: So like, it wouldn’t have made it 100% better because I think I needed a little bit more understanding of and we’ll get into this but the whole idea of the Forge and Universe destroyers, like, there were a lot of concepts that were tossed into the end of Season Two that were completely unexplained and we’ll get to that in a second. But I do think that if at least we had Strange at the end of every episode, we could see, okay, here’s the through line this season. He is the common denominator, cool. Now, when he shows up at the end, I’m like, all right, that makes sense because I’ve seen him. That makes sense that he has all these people because I watched him go get them, but he only showed up in about 2 or 3. And it just, to your point, it’s very disjointed.

Katie: Well, and you brought up the Forge who we don’t need to get to that quite yet but I do want to say, and if you listen to my initial reactions, I said this from the get go. The problem is, is listen, What If? Is not here to explain everything to us and they showed us that in Season One. We walked out of Season One and we still were like, I’m not entirely sure what this show just did other than entertain us of course, but like, is it affecting the <ultiverse? Is it not? And then of course, at the end of this season, they’re like, here’s Loki’s Tree of Life but anyway, end of season. So I think the problem was, they explained all this stuff to your point, or at least they introduced it, didn’t explain it, and so you didn’t quite understand the stakes of what Peggy and Kahorri were fighting for. They were like, okay, bad Strange, bad, trying to bring back a whole universe, not good. But because I don’t know what the Forge if it broke, what would that do? Now that he brought a universe back, what did that do? Because I don’t understand what the effects of everything were because it was never explained, it’s like I don’t really understand what defeating him did or didn’t do.

Taylor: Yeah, that’s such a good point and I think that just brings us right into the concept of the Forge. And also I’m going to toss in the the universe destroyers because I think they kind of go hand in hand in terms of both being concepts that seem like they should be really important, yet somehow were very glossed over in this episode. So let’s start with the Forge, because that’s what you were just mentioning. I think you’re right, I don’t understand how it works, how Strange found out about it, how long he’s been working on this. Clearly for a very long time, but we had no idea that any of this was happening.

Katie: Well, and does the Watcher not watch everything? Did I not follow that?

Taylor: Right and then the other thing becomes like, he so clearly wasn’t going to intervene. And what annoyed me, and I know this is going to annoy you too, is I kept wondering like, why didn’t he intervene here? This seems like just as bad a threat as UltronVision did but then he made that comment about, oh well, I have you in Peggy Carter, which is just like a whole other thing.

Katie: Oh, we’ll get to that part. We’ll get to my rant about stupid Captain Carter later.

Taylor: Yeah so basically, I just it felt very not only disjointed from the season, but also from last season and what we had done and the actions of the Watcher last season. So that didn’t make sense. I don’t understand anything about the Forge. Can anyone make a Forge? How would feeding the universe destroyers to the Forge have brought back his own universe? I have so many questions. How does this tie into what we’ve learned in something like a Loki or an MoM? I don’t even have the basic concept of what this is, and you just based an entire season finale around it with zero context. That to me is a big miss.

Katie: And it worked, that’s the scary part, is it worked because the universe did come back just without a Strange in it. He was never born in that universe, that’s what they confirm at the end. So it’s like the Forge did work, it rebuilt the universe. Again to your probably bigger question is how like, how did feeding those universe destroyers help it? And we know the final straw was Strange, which makes sense. He physically was the one who destroyed that universe. So him going into the Forge checks, that I’m like, oh, a b c I see the timeline there. I see how we get there. I don’t really understand bringing in all those other universe destroyers. I don’t really understand how they exactly help bring back his universe. I could see like if somebody built the Forge in the zombie world and they put Zombie Wanda in it, I could see that restoring that universe because it’s like, okay, she’s the one who destroys it, that checks. I just don’t really understand how or where the logic went of, like, all these other universe destroyers are able to bring back your specific universe? That doesn’t make sense to me.

Taylor: No, that’s such a good point too. I didn’t really think I thought about it that way, that having other universe destroyers doesn’t make sense. I mean, I just think the whole thing doesn’t make sense, but it does make more sense to have that particular universe’s person who’s responsible for destroying it, entering the Forge and now that universe has been reborn. I mean, I guess my question is like, what is a universe destroyer, right? I mean, I understand logically it’s a person who destroys a universe. Okay, I got that conceptually cool. But like, what do they have to do? I don’t know, like I just have so many questions, I don’t even know how to verbalize them, but like, I think the one I am able to stick to and actually say out loud is like, okay, if they destroyed their universe, is that not what’s supposed to happen in that universe, right? Because essentially every universe then becomes its own, I don’t want to bring us back all the way, but you know, it’s own Sacred Timeline in the Multiverse. Everything then, from that point on, is supposed to happen from the what if moment. So if that universe is destroyed, why does it matter if they’re a universe destroyer? I guess that’s my question. I don’t know, I have so many questions.

Katie: Well, and I guess my thing is, if you’re following this analogy, that the universe is now a tree, since we keep getting a tree shoved at us, branches die, right? I could get that concept of like, okay, sure, there was a room full of universe destroyers, but if you really think about it, in the vast majority of the entire Multiverse, they were probably 2% of the entire universe. I’m not worried about it in that way so I could see it being like, okay, I’ll keep going with Zombie Wanda as an example. Okay, she destroys her universe. I’m not sure how, she just keeps eating people, I guess, I don’t know, like I’m trying to pull memory from that episode, and all I remember is zombie Thanos showing up, which we never got a continuation of, so I’m sure she goes head to head with Thanos and at the end of the day, they probably kill the entire universe, cool. That universe dies, I see that, I understand that, that’s not weird to me. I just, I guess it’s just I still wrapping it back over to what you were saying with each of them becoming a Sacred Timeline, I guess not every branch is meant to grow, to be a big branch, you know?

Taylor: Yeah, no, I think that’s where I was kind of going with that, too, and where I was trying to wrap my head around it, is that what’s supposed to happen in each of these universes that has a universe destroyer is that that person is supposed to destroy the universe, branch done, okay, bye. But then I think what I was trying to get at earlier but was really struggling was then what happens to those universes? If they’re supposed to be dead because they have a universe destroyer and he took the destroyer out, how does that change then the trajectory of that universe? It’s almost like a second what if. So, do you have another branch that comes off of it, of that universe surviving? Like, I have so many questions to the ramifications of his little plan.

Katie: I mean, probably because remember, when he first is talking to Peggy, he’s saying, you know, I’ve been going through and I’ve been collecting these people who are destroying their universes and he shows her the whole wall and so think about how that was the point. And see, like that was Episode Eight’s point was Peggy saved a universe that was meant to die. It was having an incursion. And by the way, just got to mention my girl Wanda holding back Thor Odinson while also holding an incursion closed. Let’s just talk about that.

Taylor: I think we got the answer to who is the strongest Avenger.

Katie: Yeah, I’d say. I literally was like, you go girl, like, okay. But either way, I think that was the point of Episode Eight was saying like, that was meant to die, that universe was meant to die, was literally having incursions and she stopped them from dying. So that universe just goes back to normal. That’s why everybody disappeared when the Steve that was throwing everything off went back or whatever he did, I assumed he went back to his time because everything almost reset to where it was supposed to be at that time. So I guess my understanding is you take the destroyer out for the time being, that universe actually rights itself but then Kahorri sent them all back. So I’m not really sure then what happens. I don’t know, because that universe went back from my understanding of Episode Eight, it went back to normal when those universe destroyers were removed.

Taylor: So each universe would just go back to its normal spot, right?

Katie: Go back to like what it should have done if that universe destroyer pretty much didn’t come and destroy it.

Taylor: When they were removed, but then they went back and they would have destroyed it. Is that what you’re saying? Sorry.

Katie: I would think. No no no, yeah, I mean, I would think.

Taylor: I was thinking about Kahorri and her power when you were talking, and so I was kind of zoning for a little bit. 

Katie: You’re good, I would think, when they were removed from the equation, so again, going with zombie Wanda because it’s the easy one, it’s a through line from Season One. If she was removed I would think that her universe would never be destroyed. Will it maybe be overgrown by all zombies and everybody’s a zombie now? That’s very possible but it will live. If she is a universe destroyer now put back, her universe theoretically should now follow that path of her destroying it. Pretty much her mission, whether she knows it or not and her life on that timeline is to destroy it.

Taylor: Right, okay, so then I was following but here’s I want to just quickly deviate from this point because I want to talk about something that I was thinking about when you were talking before it leaves my mind. You mentioned Kahorri and her power, which wow, okay, she took on a Scarlet Witch, that’s pretty impressive not gonna lie. I know Katie is like meh.

Katie: I’m not saying I wasn’t impressed, but one you had a zombie version of her, and two, all she did was transport her back to her universe. She didn’t beat her. There were so many people on Twitter saying that she beat her and that she beat Hela. I was like, she transported them back to her universe. That is a very different thing than beating that. Just for the record.

Taylor: Okay, but that’s beside the point, because what I really want to talk about is what Kahorri she was doing when she was moving these people, because she was actually moving them in the Multiverse. She was transporting them from one universe to another. The reason I want to point this out is because we just spent an entire episode talking about who would be what stone and the personification of that stone. Well, I think we have our best candidate now for the Space Stone. We don’t have to have a full conversation about this, because we talked about it at length in that episode, but I didn’t want to let this episode go by having seen what we saw today, without acknowledging that we now have a top candidate for the Space Stone.

Katie: No, I 100% agree, and I think I mean any original character in general is up for grabs, I think for Marvel to do whatever with. But when you bring them in in this type of format, I mean, I would be floored if we didn’t see her make the jump to a live action. That would absolutely shock me because of who she is. I mean, she’s a very interesting character with a very interesting background. I have to say, I always applaud Marvel because I think when they do very specific cultural groups Black Panther, for example, with Wakanda, Namor and his people, whose and his society, whose name I’m currently blanking on. I mean, we’ve gotten Shang-Chi and his entire cultural background. I mean, they do them beautifully. We get an amazing introduction. And I think Kahorri is no, no different and it was also a really cool episode because they did speak native tongue. That was awesome, except I was trying to do stuff during it and forgot and then I was like, oh crap, I have to read the screen the whole time so I couldn’t multitask. But I would love to see her come into the MCU fully, and it would be a big miss not to on so many fronts. And to your point, there’s our Space Stone.

Taylor: Yeah, it almost makes me feel like we’re going towards that theory. I know in that episode, you and I talked about how Space and Reality are such strong proof, really credibility for that theory. And then you get into Space and Power and all of those and you’re like, oh, but really though. But now you have three out of six, so that’s 50% already that are looking strong. And to your point that you were making in that episode, a lot of characters have to go through major trials or important evolutions in order to become the person who’s going to embody the stone and we have options on the table for the remaining three who could move forward, grow, evolve to become the personification in the same way that Kahorri was not the personification when we first meet her, but through her experiences in this show, she becomes the personification. So I don’t want to spend any more time on this because it’s all about What If? but I definitely think that it’s an interesting connector to a recent episode that we did and a recent theory that we talked about and I really wanted to just explore it a little bit, because it’s making me more and more excited about the potential of that actually coming true.

Katie: Yeah, that’s definitely a fair point. I’m glad you brought that up because honestly, I was distracted during this episode. Part of me being like, I don’t really know what’s going on because again, I didn’t think One through Eight led us to this point. And two, there was a lot going on, and I was more distracted by all the universe destroyers than anything else because I was like, ah, interesting character there, ooh, interesting character there. So I was more distracted by that. I didn’t even give thought to the fact that Kahorri was literally putting them back through the Multiverse. So that was a good thing to kind of point out, too, because my brain never even got there. I was too busy looking at everybody else.

Taylor: Yeah. I mean, to your point, there is just so much going on. There’s so many questions. And then, you brought up this a couple times, but I want to dive deeper. Why did we get the tree at the end? What is the point?

Katie: Well, and that’s Season Three’s problem now.

Taylor: I know.

Katie: I’m like hold on because your entire marketing revolved around this dang tree as a Christmas tree, which I understood why they did that. But now we’re sitting here, and that was the last scene, and I mean, I did see someone on Twitter before the show came out who said they predicted it. They were saying, that’s going to be the final scene. And it’s like, but why? And why, this can get right into this conversation, why Peggy Carter? I am sorry, but I okay, I will guys genuinely put aside my feelings for her and speak logic here but out of everybody in a Multiverse, why Captain Carter? Why is she like the Watcher’s chosen intern, essentially?

Taylor: Yeah. I don’t have the same strong feelings you have, obviously, for Captain Carter. I’m not a huge fan of her character. I agree with a lot of your sentiment, though, on a much more mild and measured manner.

Katie: Well, I’m putting my feelings aside at the current moment. My feelings might come out later, but at the current moment they are side for the logic.

Taylor: Right but I’m just saying I can come at it probably slightly more objectively than you can at any given time. And I do agree, like it does not make sense for when you have so many versions of Doctor Strange. He’s a bad example because he’s like 75% evil in most of the universes, but you have so many versions of Doctor Strange. You have multiple versions of the Scarlet Witch. Well, not the Scarlet Witch but of Wanda maximoff. You have multiple versions, probably of a Kahorri, right? These incredibly strong beings. Hela, I mean, Thor.

Katie: Loki. 

Taylor: Yeah. I mean literally the God of the Multiverse right now. But like so many versions of incredibly powerful characters who more logically and more realistically, I mean, not that we’re going for realism, we’re talking about a Multiverse here, I get it. But more likely would step into this role then in enhanced Super Soldier. I have no hate for super soldiers. I’m a Cap girl. Literally, you can’t see me, I’m wearing a Captain America shirt right now. That’s not my problem. It’s just that they don’t belong, Super Soldiers in general, Peggy Carter, more specifically, do not belong as the poster children of the Multiverse or the Watcher’s right hand lady. It just doesn’t make sense.

Katie: Well, and if I’m being completely honest, I’m tired of her. Whatever in Season One, I was fine with Season One because as much as I didn’t really like her because I don’t like Peggy, I was like, okay, she got her first episode and then she came in for the ending. I thought Season One made sense. Okay, so we had a sequel in this season. Okay, I was still fine with it. In fact, I raved about the episode because it still had many, many great elements to it that I could look past the fact that I don’t really like her character and still say, this was an amazing episode, but why is she holding down What If? at this point? Because this show is called What If? There are so many heroes and scenarios that you could put, like when am I finally getting anybody from Phase Four and beyond? Can I ask that question? Because we’ve gotten what, we’ve gone to Shang-Chi’s world, and we didn’t even see Shang-Chi because we went years before him. He won’t even be born in that universe, most likely. And so we saw that, cool. What else? I mean, we literally went to the Black Widow’s, didn’t see Yelena, which that was weird to me because I was like, logically, she should still be there.

Taylor: Where’s my BFF Kamala Khan? Hello?

Katie: Where’s Kamala? Where’s Captain Marvel? Any of them? Maria, Monica, Carol, any of the people who take on the Captain Marvel moniker at some point, where are they? Oh, well, forget about Sam. They’re like, let’s shove Peggy down your throat and forget we have a brand new Captain America, which I’m heated about, I’m angry.

Taylor: Where are the X-Men?

Katie: Where are the Eternals?

Taylor: You can bring the X-Men into live action, and you can give them their own animated show but you can’t show me a universe where the X-Men exists. I’m sorry. What?

Katie: Where are the Eternals? You want to tell me that the Eternals are some of the most powerful beings in the entire everything, like cosmos, pretty much.

Taylor: Celestials, not the Eternals.

Katie: No, I’m talking about the Eternals.

Taylor: But the Celestials are way more powerful than the Eternals.

Katie: I know, but I’m not talking about Celestials because we didn’t see the Celestials. We saw the Eternals. They’re still extremely powerful beings who pretty much build the world and build planets. Granted, they build planets to die, but they were building planets. And you’re going to tell me there aren’t plenty of What If? scenarios with the Eternals that exist, who live on the planets for hundreds of thousands of years sometimes before they’re big enough to birth the Celestials? Like, where are they? Where is Kate Bishop? Where are these people? 

Taylor: Agatha?

Katie: Oh, yeah, well, that’s what I mean. Like, where is Vision? Other than UltronVision, he was MIA. I mean, he’s still MIA in the entirety of the MCU right now. We have people from Phases One through Three who we haven’t seen in a while either but like, we have been introduced to She-Hulk.

Taylor: Moon Knight.

Katie: I was just about say, Moon Knight. We have all these characters that you just spent almost three years introducing us to, and you still can’t put them in a What If? scenario but I keep getting stupid Captain Carter every five seconds. Why? That does not make sense to me. I’m exhausted of her. Please, for the love of God, I don’t know what Hayley Atwell has done to get in with the MCU and the Marvel Studios, but please, I’m at this point begging Season Three, just do anything else.

Taylor: I hate to be the bearer of bad news, and I texted you this earlier so you won’t be surprised but I’m going to say it for the benefit of the listeners.

Katie: Girl I’m sweating. I just got so heated I’m sweating.

Taylor: Okay. Well, I’m going to need you to take it back a notch because I’m trying to make a point. But unfortunately, I think the raising of Captain Carter in this way at the end of this season does mean that she is going to come back into live action, and she will probably make it all the way through a movie.

Katie: It’s wrong.

Taylor: Which I personally don’t love the character, so I don’t necessarily want to see it because I do think she’s been kind of shoved down our throats and it’s not a character I’m invested in. It’s not a character I particularly care about. I also know that Katelyn is deeply unhappy about the idea that she might survive through a movie.

Katie: It’s not even that. I’m mad because two years ago, more than two, almost three years ago, you gave us a brand new Captain America, and the MCU has done nothing but ignore the man, and he doesn’t even make it in What If? anymore. Like where is Sam Wilson? Where is any version of Sam Wilson? Like, that is why I’m annoyed. I don’t like her and that’s a fair thing. That’s just my feelings and to your point, she is being shoved down our throats. I’m exhausted of it. It’s too much like you could pick any other character, and that’s who you pick and you just, like, will not let her go. But it’s like, why are we getting so much of her but we are getting nearly nothing on our brand new Captain America?

Taylor: I’m gonna play devil’s advocate for you here.

Katie: Girl.

Taylor: I know, I know, but let me try to balance the scales. We’re going to try to add some objectivity to this. There is in my head, if I’m thinking about it from a marketer’s standpoint, right, or a storytelling standpoint, which kind of goes hand in hand. I do see the argument that you don’t want Sam’s first time truly being Captain America, not in the show that created or evolved him into Captain America, I personally see the argument of saying, I don’t want that first time to be a what if scenario of Sam being Cap. I don’t mind having to wait. I mean, it’s annoying that the movie got pushed back another year, which is frustrating, but I don’t mind waiting to give Sam his big red carpet moment for his own movie. That’s something I’m okay with. So that’s why when you’re saying where is Sam? I’m like, all right, maybe they’re going to give him the full star treatment when they fully give him his own film as Captain America.

Katie: I will support your devil’s advocate to the grave if I have to. However, he doesn’t need to be Cap in a what if scenario. And what I don’t think is right is that from my knowledge that I can remember so far, just because Season One’s a little blurry. He was only in the zombie episode from what I can remember. We had an entire second season, we didn’t hear from him. And what’s worse is and listen, we all know I celebrated because Bucky was in about 17 episodes.

Taylor: You were eating well.

Katie: I was eating well. And with the already released clip from Season Three like girls ready. But why was there no Sam in anything involving that? I mean even Episode Eight, they had Scott kind of as that trio rather than Sam.

Taylor: That’s true.

Katie: Which fine, he was fun and I liked him, but like, why no, Sam? Why was the choice made to not include Sam there? Or I think there were I mean, I could see that Winter soldier one not really counting, because if it wasn’t Cap, like Steve running with Sam, I could have seen why he never really would have been brought into the circle in that one. I just, I don’t know, like, I’m aggravated because there were plenty of times I do think the opportunity arose and there are plenty of what if scenarios I’m sure we could run with, with him and I just feel like he’s being ignored. And it’s rough to me because I think there was a lot of, I don’t wanna say backlash, because I don’t want to say there was a lot of like, bad stuff, but there were a lot of people who were not really necessarily in love with the fact that Sam became Cap. I was not one of them. As much as I love my Buck Buck, I adore Sam, so I don’t care. I think he’s gonna do great.

Taylor: To those people, pick up a comic like, truly go pick up a comic.

Katie: Well, yeah, and that too. I was like, they both become Cap at different points. Bucky was in no way, shape or form in the MCU prepared to do that. So I was like, it made sense. I liked it, and I love that Bucky is still hanging out with him like they’re my favorite duo, so I’m good, I’m happy. But regardless, I mean, when you have people who are kind of giving some backlash on that and then you ignore the character for three years, but you give us Captain Carter instead the entire time. That’s just frustrating to me. And it’s like, I don’t know. I don’t know how to explain it without getting even more sweaty because I’m hot, but I’m frustrated. Even if they are holding him for a big moment, where is he? It’s just aggravating and we’re just stuck with Captain Carter and I’m mad.

Taylor: Yeah, I don’t disagree that I think we should be bringing Sam in. I mean, I love the guy. I think he’s an awesome character. To your point, he doesn’t have to be Captain America in a What If? scenario. The last scenario, the one you mentioned, which was the zombie one, he was just the Falcon, which is a perfectly good opportunity.

Katie: Well, you could actually run with what if, speaking of The Falcon and Winter Soldier, what if he ended up with the serum instead of John? You could run with actually making him a super soldier, the options are there. And again, I don’t know why we seem to be avoiding all the content they just put out for the past like two and a half, three years, but there are so many what if scenarios we could have run with within the past three years of content, including The Falcon and Winter Soldier.

Taylor: Yeah, I mean, you’re totally right. It’s definitely something that I hope that we see in a Season Three. And on that note, I do think we have to address the little surprise that we all got right at the end of Season Two, which is that Season Three is apparently coming soon.

Katie: Not even coming soon, they said, here’s a clip.

Taylor: Well, yeah, but if you listen to our 2023 recap and 2024 preview, neither one of us mentioned What If? Season Three as something that we were even expecting, because up until the end of Season Two, we had heard not even a confirmation it was coming, but apparently it’s almost done. So I’m not complaining, I’m just confused.

Katie: Yeah, I mean, my perspective of it, because I was finding this on Twitter as I was on there after watching the episode and well, first I was like, because the clip that dropped, if you don’t know and you haven’t seen it by now, it’s Bucky and the Red Guardian, which love. I mean, they are prepping us for the Thunderbolts and that is what I’m ready for, so I love it. And I’m seeing everybody say it’s the continuation of the I can’t remember the episode, I think it was Episode Two when the Avengers assembled in like the 80s. So I’m seeing everybody saying that that’s what that is, and that’s Bucky’s like, that’s a continuation of Bucky’s story because obviously he doesn’t stay with the Avengers. So another sequel, maybe Bucky is going to be a main character, I don’t know. If sequels have one thing they seem to make main characters, but that clip dropped. I don’t know if it dropped the same day that Episode Nine came out, that’s when I happened to see it, or if it came out like the day before or whatever, but I’m watching it super confused and next thing I know, everybody’s like, yeah, so like, What If? Season Three confirmed and coming soon. And I was like, whoa, like what? So my understanding of it is a lot of these episodes were probably done in tandem and so a lot of them are done and so they’re kind of sitting on them. That’s my impression of what I was getting. That is just my thoughts. Not saying that is Bible to anybody, that’s what I got off Twitter, essentially.

Taylor: Yeah, I almost wonder if they were doing them in tandem and they weren’t sure which episodes were going to end up in what season and that’s why this season seems so funky, because it was very much like independent episodes, which I was fine with. But then you get to Nine and that’s why I said, like, well, that’s not why but now that I’m thinking about it, it makes so much more sense my comment before that Episode Nine seems like it was the ending of a different season. I’m almost wondering if some of what should have been in Two ended up in Three because they did all of them together.

Katie: Well, I will say, I think I don’t agree with that necessarily, only because I do think Nine felt disjointed, but they didn’t bring anybody in. And that’s why I also had a problem with the finale was I was like, are we not getting a real team up? All we’re getting, not in a bad way, but I’m like, we’re only getting Captain Carter and Kahorri? It felt weird. It felt strange because to your point then that makes all those other episodes I said it earlier just feel very weird. So I don’t know if that was necessarily the problem in that sense, but I do think some of these might be getting sequels, as we now know that’s a thing. And since it seems like the released clip is going to be a sequel to one we’ve already gotten now in Season Two, I don’t know, I just feel like maybe they should have just avoided doing a culminating episode in Nine.

Taylor: Yeah, I think if they had, maybe even done a culmination between 2 and 3 and been like, this is two separate seasons, but they all like, how many times do you watch a show where, yes, there’s a season finale of a specific season, but there are storylines that cross over into the next season that it make it even bigger, right? I can’t think of any off the top of my head, but actually, no, I can. Succession, for example, every season has a season finale, but the end of the show is who’s going to get the company. Those are storylines that have gone on from Season One, Two, Three, Four, right. You can do that.

Katie: I am beyond shocked you didn’t say Agents of SHIELD as like a prime example of a bunch of storylines that go into Season 3 or 4 or whatever.

Taylor: I just mean like, say, Season Three is the end of What If, right? Which we have no idea because clearly they’re not telling us one way or another when there’s an end to this show. But I mean, like Succession was all the storylines wrapped up in that one finale. So there were storylines from early on from the middle of the show, from the end of the show, and that finale was done. You were done with the Roy family. You’re right, each season of Agents of SHIELD led to the next season, but I’m looking at the storyline, the narrative as a whole, which of course some of that does. But that’s why I was like, oh, it’s more of like the end of the final season, the final episode gives you the answer from the very first episode of the show. Like it’s wrapping these storylines that kept going for years, seasons and seasons.

Katie: I mean fair, I didn’t watch Succession, so I have no clue. I just was thinking from your criteria, I was like, Agents of SHIELD does that, and it’s a Marvel podcast we’re on so I was like, I don’t know, seems pretty, to the point.

Taylor: Or even, I mean, think about Loki, the only other show we’ve gotten a sequel to. The end of Season Two, and Tom Hiddleston has said this, it wasn’t just the end of a season, it was the end of the show. It was the end of everything that we saw in One and Two. It all culminated into that one moment. If you want a Marvel specific example, you could have done that. One could have been self-contained, okay, but some storylines moved into Two and we saw the relationship between Captain Carter and the Watcher, as we saw with Doctor Strange and Captain Carter’s relationship, those things persisted. That knowledge that those characters had or gained, that persisted. Okay, great. But we could have a culminating moment in Three, that is, from the storylines of Two and Three. We didn’t need this forced culminating moment in Two that really was just confusing and honestly, a little bit dumb. Like not to be rude, but it was a little dumb.

Katie: No, it’s fair because if you take out Kahorri’s episode and you take out Captain Carter’s, that’s leaving us, what, Five or, so more than half the season had nothing to do with this, really. Like, yeah, we saw Hela, but that wasn’t our version of Hela that we saw from her episode. And yeah, we saw Happy Hogan as a Hulk, but we also saw that we saw him in the saved Christmas episode, but then we also saw him in Episode Eight that he clearly was also like a weird version of the Hulk, and he still might not have been for either of those. So it was just weird and they also okay, we saw him for what? 10 seconds if that, like it’s not like he played a real part in the episode. He didn’t make a life changing choice. So it’s like I agree with why couldn’t we have okay, honestly, actually, I could just say this: if you wanted to do a different format, cool. Season One did great, pulling everybody together. You didn’t want to do that again? Fine, then make them all separate, no one’s going to complain. I didn’t need it to end in a culminating episode of any sort, I can just watch What If? scenarios for the rest of my life, and I will be happy because they are so cool to me.

Taylor: Yeah, and I mean, realistically, the only throughline has to be the Watcher.

Katie: And apparently Peggy Carter.

Taylor: Stop stop stop.

Katie: I wish they would.

Taylor: But baseline, it just has to be the Watcher and all he has to do is tell me a little bit about the Multiverse and the way that it works, you know, just drop a line every other episode to further that whole understanding of the Multiverse for the audience and you’re good. You’ve literally hit my baseline criteria, and I just, I don’t know, I hope that they right the ship a little bit in Three because up through this episode, I was really quite happy with the season.

Katie: Yeah. I mean, I will say and I don’t think I don’t speak for a good number of people from my impressions, again, on being on Twitter and even on like some Instagram comments of, you know, we went into this and we weren’t super excited about a lot of them because I do think there are some really cool what if scenarios that are a lot bigger. And I do think some of the episodes redeemed themselves. They also weren’t well titled, if we’re being honest, because a lot of the times the actual What If? scenario wasn’t what the title was so it was very weird.

Taylor: It was very misleading.

Katie: It was because and not in a good way because the whole point is that literal sentence of what if this other decision was made is supposed to guide the episode. So this is not the place to be a misleading, in my opinion. I keep thinking of the Hela one where it’s like, what if Hela found the Ten Rings? But like that wasn’t the change, so I don’t know. Anyway, just as an example, but I will say, I think a lot of people didn’t love a lot of the episodes going into it. I think some of them redeem themselves, but I do think there were probably a few that I still sit here and I’m like, eh, you could have done a better one. So I kind of hope they take that step back, as you said, and do what they’ve been starting to do is listen to the fans and what they like from what they were doing, what they don’t like and what did you say? Right the ship, you know, and and put us back on a path because I loved Season One. You didn’t know what you were getting. And I loved this season until you try to make a culminating point out of nothing and then I just was like, oh, okay, that’s the end of that show.

Taylor: Yeah, I agree, I think it was good until they forced a culmination on us and then it was just they lost me.

Katie: Well, and you don’t have to. It’s literally the only type of show you never have to have a season finale.

Taylor: Oh, totally and knowing that Season Three is on the heels, you know, you could literally have just gone right into it almost and again, done the full culminating for the two or not at all. Change it up, I don’t care. But I didn’t need this because it feels like a wasted episode now, because I still don’t really get it and I think my last thing I’ll say about the season finale is my worries that they’re never, ever going to bring up the concept of the Forge or the concept of a universe destroyer ever again and I have so many questions. That, to me, was the most interesting part of the finale and if I don’t get that addressed again, I’m going to be very, very angry.

Katie: No, and that’s a really fair point and the reason I also have that concern is because we had an entire Multiversal war almost against UltronVision, who is destroying countless universes in Season One, and that just kind of got swept right under the rug. We just ignored that after the fact. The MCU didn’t follow that track and listen, we don’t yet know where this is going to go with the MCU. I mean, we see the tree now, cool, but still, we don’t have a for sure connection, so fine, the MCU ignores it. But then even in this season, I kind of was like, oh, we’re just we don’t really mention that. And then when he was like, all these people were breaking out, I’m pretty sure I saw UltronVision or maybe it was just a Vision, I don’t know. But I was like, did UltronVision just break out because last I knew he was like, stuck in jail pretty much.

Taylor: In that exact type of jail.

Katie: Right so I was like, what just happened there?

Taylor: And wasn’t he in with Killmonger who did break out?

Katie: Yeah, I think so. And I’m also pretty sure I thought Strange was in there with them. I thought all three of them were in there.

Taylor: I don’t remember, I do need to rewatch the season.

Katie: I don’t remember either but regardless, I was like, did we just release UltronVision? Where is that, what is happening? Because he’s still a very clear threat.

Taylor: Maybe we’ll get a resolution in Season Three, I don’t know.

Katie: Well, that’s why though I’m concerned to your point about the Forge and universe destroyers and everything else, because we didn’t really get much reference or conversation around the ending of Season One. So I’m a little concerned we’re going to have the same thing happen in Season Two and this felt like Season One of Loki, where they introduce all this crap and we were like, but what does it mean? And for two years we were really confused for a while and then Season Two, they were like, let’s explain it all and we’re like, oh, okay, cool.

Taylor: Yeah. The good news is, with Season Three coming apparently soon, we don’t actually have to wait two years and maybe we’ll get, that’s why I’m hoping Season Three is a little bit more.

Katie: Maybe it’ll drop next Christmas again.

Taylor: But if it’s coming soon, like next Christmas isn’t soon.

Katie: Dude, I couldn’t tell you. Coming soon is a very broad term.

Taylor: Oh, I totally agree and I’m like annoyed that they never even told us this was coming ever. Like they literally confirmed it by saying coming soon.

Katie: And dropping a clip.

Taylor: We did an entire preview episode Marvel. People are preparing for the year ahead, and you’re just now telling us this is coming without even giving us a real time frame.

Katie: Did you watch the clip?

Taylor: I did.

Katie: I don’t wanna get carried away on this, but you know who everyone’s speculating the officers related to, right?

Taylor: Tell me.

Katie: The woman officer. Her last name is Morales.

Taylor: Oh, I didn’t catch that. I didn’t catch her name plate.

Katie: I don’t know if they, I can’t remember if they said it or not or whatever, but, like, everybody was like, oop.

Taylor: Stop now I’m like, literally about to die.

Katie: That’s why I was like, wow, you really didn’t say anything. 

Taylor: You know how I feel about Miles Morales. 

Katie: What an interesting way, if possible, to bring him in too. 

Taylor: I can’t.

Katie: Where was Spider-Man this season?

Taylor: No, literally I was thinking about that, too.

Katie: I didn’t even think about it just because it’s been a while. He’s been off the map for a while, but like, where’s Peter?

Taylor: And didn’t they confirm that for Season Two Tom Holland was doing voice acting? Because in Season One it was not Tom Holland and I remember one of the big things being that What If? Season Two, Tom Holland was going to be in it. So okay, I’m going to put out a quick theory for Season Three.

Katie: He was voicing Season Three.

Taylor: They did Two and Three together, his episode got moved and we’re going to see Miles Morales and Peter Parker together.

Katie: Oh that’ll be interesting. I didn’t think you were gonna go that far, but yeah, I wouldn’t be against it. I don’t know though, because that episode, at least I don’t know how far into Miles if they’re going to do that, they’re going to go. But that episode’s at least like in the 70s or 80s or no, it’s still in the 80s or 90s, I should say, because that’s the Bucky and Red Guardian and they’re young. Well, Bucky’s always young, but the Red Guardian is young, and it’s like his great, like grandmother or like everybody saying it’s like his grandmother or his great aunt so I don’t know, I can’t remember because I was distracted by Bucky, but, yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know if we’d actually see him or if we’re getting more of the hint, but I definitely will say, like, I do think they probably did a lot of them together because clearly Seb did that one because that was Seb.

Taylor: Yeah. I mean, if it’s the 90s though, it could be Miles, well Miles’ mom isn’t the officer though, it’s his dad.

Katie: I’m not 100% sure.

Taylor: It’s a what if so it doesn’t really matter. You said the word Miles Morales and like now I can’t think about anything else. So I think we might have to wrap this episode up before I go down some, like, crazy rabbit holes about Miles coming into the MCU officially. I’m going to cry from happiness like I can’t even explain to you all.

Katie: It would be a cool way to do it, especially since we know we’re heading towards Secret Wars. It would be a really cool way to kind of just start laying that groundwork.

Taylor: And if it’s timed any time around Beyond the Spider-Verse, I mean, there are so many options we have four Sonyverse movies. 

Katie: Maybe that’s what they’re holding on. They’re going to say coming soon until they know for sure when the final Spider-verse movie is coming.

Taylor: Yeah, but I really okay, I really though at the end of Beyond the Spider-Verse, I want him to jump into live action. I don’t want him to go back into animation. I want to see Miles in live action so I don’t want like a halfway jump. I want the full jump.

Katie: Well, maybe we’ll get the groundwork like right before the movie. So we don’t actually see him, but we start to get the groundwork of like, clearly he exists, or at least his family does.

Taylor: Well, I mean, we already know his uncle’s already been in Spider-Man.

Katie: Well, right but I mean, like in another universe clearly starting to really bring that together. 

Taylor: Yeah. Although, isn’t Miles only supposed to be a spider whatever, I can’t, there’s a whole thing. We all know I could talk about this forever and I’m going to cap us here before we go on another tangent. But long story short, I enjoyed Season Two. I think they missed the mark on the ending, but I’m hoping that they right it for Season Three. I’m excited that it’s coming soon and overall good season. I’m going to retroactively probably put this as number one of my shows for 2023, because we didn’t get a chance to really give it a proper space in our review of last year, because we’d only seen one episode at the time. So I’m going to give it the number one spot, but definitely excited for Season Three.

Katie: Yeah, I guess I’ll have to give it the number one spot too, because I mean, it’s hard because they all fumbled the bag on the last episode.

Taylor: I know. I literally was thinking last night I was like, oh, this is going to be a no brainer. We’re going to go ahead and give this the top spot and then it also fumbled the bag and I was like, why can nobody finish the season?

Katie: Yeah, I mean actually I’m going to eat back my words that I just said, I’m going to keep Loki actually in the top spot, mainly because I love Tom Hiddleston. And regardless if you’re going to fumble the bag, am I going to put Peggy Carter higher than Loki? Absolutely not. So I’m going to keep Loki up at the top, but I will move What If? into the second slot because I just need to forget Secret Invasion happened. 

Taylor: Don’t we all, don’t we all? All right, on that note, we are going to wrap this episode up. It is our first of 2024, first of many of 2024, and we are excited to continue coverage of all the new shows and movies coming out this year. So make sure you’re staying with us, checking out our website, subscribing on your podcast platform of choice, and supporting the show if you may be so inclined. We have some new things coming down the road that may make that a little easier. So more to come on that, but definitely make sure you’re keeping up with all of our stuff on the site.

Katie: Make sure you guys are giving us a follow on Twitter at SisAssembledPod and Instagram and Threads at SistersAssembled. You can also follow us on YouTube at Sisters Assembled so go on there, subscribe to us on there, follow us, whatever you got to do, keep up with us. That’s all that matters. And as always, we are going to be kicking it off pretty quickly already with Echo predictions, believe it or not. That is also dropping all at once so if you were not aware of that, I’m breaking the news that we are getting all, I believe, five episodes at once on one day. So get ready but first prepare with predictions coming next time. So stick with us, stick with Marvel because Marvel just blew your mind, so let’s talk about it.